Tour Plan :

09:30 Meeting with your Driver in Venice Piazzale Roma and starting the Tour. You will drive along the "Castellana" Road. A short stop in Piombino Dese to see Villa Cornaro. The villa was realised at Piombino Dese for a powerful Venetian patrician, Giorgio Cornaro, on 1553 by Andrea Palladio. The plan of the Villa Cornaro is organised around a great space with four free-standing columns, here moreover shifted more to the centre of the house and therefore more properly a salone. Access to this room is mediated by a loggia or a narrow vestibule. The two levels of the villa are connected by twinned elegant staircases, which completely separate the ground floor (for the reception of guests and clients) from the two upper apartments (reserved for the Cornaro couple). The extraordinary, projecting, two-storey pronaos reflects Palladio’s design for the loggia at the Palazzo Chiericati in Vicenza, completed in the same years, with the side opening again blocked by a wall which confers rigidity on the structure just as in the Porticus of Octavia
in Rome. Now the Villa is owned by the "Gable" family.

10:30 Another short stop in Castelfranco Veneto, a pleasant citadel surrounded by moats. It has a few pretty
arcaded houses and is the birthplace of the artist Giorgione (1478-1510). The cathedral contains his
masterpiece, the Madonna and Child with Saints.

11:30 In Marostica, you will stop in "Piazza Castello". The main square of this charming small medieval city serves as a giant chessboard for a highly original game of chess - Partita a Scacchi - with costumed people as the chessmen.
The story of the Chess Game dates back to 1454 when Marostica belonged to the Venetian Republic. It happened that two noblemen, Rinaldo D'Angarano and Vieri da Vallonara, fell in love with the beautiful Lionora, daughter of Taddeo Parisio, who was the Lord of the Marostica's castle. As was the custom in that time, they challenged each other to a cruel duel to win the hand of Lionora. The Lord, not wanting to make an enemy of either suitors or loose them in a duel, forbade the encounter in conformity with Cangrande della Scala's Edict. He decided the two rivals should play a chess game: Lionora would take the winner as her husband and the loser would in any case join his family, marrying Oldrada, the younger sister. The game should take place on the square in front of the Lower Castle on a feast-day with armed living persons carrying the noble ensigns of Whites and Blacks, in the presence of the Lord, his noble daughter, the Lords of Angarano and Vallonara, the noble court and the entire population. This event is repeated today just like the first time, in a framework of sumptuous costumes, multi-colour banners, martial parades, exquisite elegance.

12:30 You are in Bassano del Grappa, a pottery town which also produces Grappa, is built on the banks of the Brenta River. The town is attractive, its narrow streets lined by painted houses and the squares bordered by arcades. At the centre is Piazza Garibaldi. The covered bridge (Ponte Coperto) is well known in Italy: in October 1567 the vigorous flood waters of the river Brenta swept away the historic bridge, a roofed timber structure on piles, which had formed the primary communicating route between Bassano and Vicenza.
Palladio, who was involved in its reconstruction process right from the months immediately after the collapse.
In Bassano the driver will suggest you a nice restaurant.

1430 You leave Bassano to reach Asolo 1500 You are in Asolo. The streets of this attractive medieval little town, dominate by its castle, are lined with palaces painted with frescoes. The town is closely associated with Robert Browning and Eleonora Duse, the famous Italian tragic actress who interpreted the works of Gabriele D'Annunzio. Duse is buried in the peaceful cemetery of Sant'Anna.

16:00 Time to return back to Venice. On the way short stop to see the façade of 2 important Palladian Villas:
Villa Barbaro in Maser end Villa Emo in Fanzolo.

17:30 Arrival Venice Piazzale Roma

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